


Reunions: Prologue (OLD - See Notes)

by LoneTenno



Category: Warframe
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-21
Updated: 2018-04-21
Packaged: 2019-04-25 18:00:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14384031
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LoneTenno/pseuds/LoneTenno
Summary: Operator Rona's encounter with the Queens and the events following it have left her changed. But now memories are resurfacing, and with each comes pain. For Rona, these are only the beginning of a longer quest: one deeply personal to her.





	Reunions: Prologue (OLD - See Notes)

**Author's Note:**

> **Update** July 6, 2018  
> I've been busy rewriting this story, and a lot of it will be changed. This work will remain up for posterity, but I most likely will not return to this work as-is.

The Queen’s voice haunted her dreams, laughing. Like old, decrepit fingers running across skin, it made her hair stand up on end, and her stomach became weak. No, it wasn’t the voice nor the Queen herself that made the dreams harrowing, it was the memory of the whole ordeal. It was the dams that broke, flooding her with memories she had thought missing.

Memories of the Zariman. Of her friends. Of her parents.

Opening her eyes to the same view of the stars, Rona sat up from her makeshift bedroll in her personal quarters. A name flickered through her mind: _Beli_. She remembered them faintly, but when she tried to chase those memories, they evaded her. All she had left were feelings: fear, regret, worry, and some things that made her face burn and her heart race.

Her kavat, Lapis, laid by her feet, undisturbed by her awakening. Rubbing her eyes, she pulled her legs to her chest, running a hand through her hair and straightening the black and purple length out.

She never felt rested anymore, only slightly less tired. Sleep helped little; if she didn’t wake up in the middle of the night, unable to fall back to sleep, then she slept too long and felt like crap when she woke. Rona hated sleeping, but knew should couldn’t stay awake forever.

Getting up, she stretched out and went to pick up her suit from the bench, tapping a button her somachord’s interface and playing a song; some slow, peaceful song. She heard Lapis yawn before giving her an annoyed meow. “I know,” Rona mumbled, yawning at the end. “But hey, you’ve always got an incubator to sleep in.”

Dismissively, Lapis growled and put his head back down. After slipping into her suit, Rona tied up her hair and finished stretching out, letting out a satisfied groan that woke Lapis up once more. She quickly knelt beside him and gave him a quick scratch behind his ear before kissing the top of his head, an adorable purr coming from her loyal kavat. “Ordis, are you awake?”

“I do not sleep, Operator.” Rona had wished he understood sarcasm, but she didn’t have the heart to teach him. “Is there something you need?”

“How’re Ronin’s repairs going?” She asked. “Is he ready to fight?”

It took a second for Ordis to get the information, though Rona considered the pause was for her sake and not his. “You Warframe is almost repaired, Operator. It will take some time considering the extent of the damage.”

Rona made her way to the doors of her quarters, watching them slide open and reveal the rest of her Orbiter. To her right was the door of her Somatic Link, while straight ahead, covered with infested biomass, was the Heminth infirmary where Ronin was currently undergoing his healing. She asked Ordis, “Have any good conversations with Helminth recently?”

“Helminth? _We’re giving a name to that infested piece of-_ Why no, Operator, I have not,” he said. “Operator, was that a joke?”

Holding back a chuckle, Rona shook her head. “Yes Ordis, it was a joke. And yes: I am amused,” she said. She entered her Somatic Link, stopping just in front of her transference node.

_“Rona?"_

She felt light-headed, and her body was numb. She was in the dark, someone breathing softly beside her. _“Yes?”_

_“Do you think we’ll make it?”_

There was silence. Hesitation. Uncertainty. _“I don’t know...”_

“Operator?”

Suddenly, she was back in the somatic link, standing at the foot of her transference node. Rona was panting, and her skin was cold; sweat covered her arms and face, her heart beating quickly. She didn’t dare speak, unsure of what to think as she tried to piece together what she had experienced. But nothing came of it.

Ordis grew worried. “Operator, you’re beginning to scare me. _WAKE UP!”_

His shout snapped her out of it. Looking all around her, she scanned the somatic link for any trace of her irregular visitor. She found nothing. Confusion and fear started to grip her mind. Rona breathed, forcing herself to think clearly. “I’m fine, Ordis, it was just... maybe a memory I had.”

“If you say so, Operator,” he replied, not too subtle in his disbelief. Shaking her head clear of the fog, Rona finally took her seat at the transference node—unsure of herself as the node closed.

 

* * *

 

_“Shh, breathe. Keep your voice low.”_

Rona looked around the halls of Lua, unsure of how she got there, or why she took her Nyx Prime. The doors in front of her slid to the side, a staircase descending in front of her. Cautious, Rona pulled her Braton Prime and kept it ready. She made her way down slowly—unsure of what she’d find.

At the bottom was the Reservoir, the stasis pods long since vacated. One was facing her, open and empty. Something drew her to it, a familiar air she couldn’t name.

_“Wait here, I’ll draw them off!”_

Rona kept making her way forward, ignoring the voices. _“No, it’s too dangerous!”_ Lowering her rifle, Rona slowly made her way forward.

_“You’ll be safe here.”_

_“I can’t, I’m not...”_

Her hand reached out to the pod, slowly losing feeling to a tingling sensation. _“Trust me.”_ Rona’s hand met the pod. She lost all feeling in her Warframe, and even in her Transference Node, she couldn’t see or hear a thing.

_“I don’t want to die, Ro...”_

Her eyes snapped open, her head in searing, blinding pain. The transference node opened up as she stumbled out and fell to the floor, screaming and crying. Her hands grabbed at her hair and her skull, futilely searching for a way to stop the pain. She could still see flashes... hear what her Warframe could hear, distorted into an incomprehensible static that assaulted her senses.

“Operator?! Operator!”

Rona tried to push herself off the ground, but her arms shook too much, and gave out. “Or... Ordis...!” she cried, her voice straining. A black haze creeped from the corners of her vision, the pain becoming near unbearable. She could hear the door to the somatic link open, footsteps coming closer. Suddenly the pain became too much: Rona let her head fall.

The last thing she felt before the black was someone picking her up.

 

* * *

 

“Beli...”

Slowly, she blinked and took a slow breath in. She was on her side, looking out the viewport of her quarters, laying in someone’s lap. Carefully, Rona turned her head. Her Excalibur, Ronin, sat inert at the foot of the mediation platform, his operator’s head placed on his thighs. She sat up, making sure to take it slow as she did so. Her head hurt all over, but it was no longer a blinding pain; a dull headache at best. Her awakening alerted her Cephalon. “Operator? Are you okay?”

Swallowing, Rona felt the skin on her neck burn, and the inside of her throat felt rough; her hand covered her neck immediately. “I’ve felt better,” she replied, her voice giving out at the end. Pulling her hand back, she froze when she saw blood covering it.

“I was worried, Operator: your transference signal spiked and then you- _TURNED BATSH-_ started screaming! And then you brought yourself here...”

“Wait: did you say that I brought _myself_ here?”

Ordis paused. “Yes, do you not remember?”

Pulling her legs to her chest, Rona glanced back at her Warframe. His gash hadn’t healed yet, infested parts showing through the cracks in his armor. But yet, he was there. She didn’t switch Warframes last second, nor could she remember the past few... minutes? Hours? Days?

But when she thought, she could do so clearly. She remembered a face... Somewhere, once buried, was Beli.

Turning back to the view port, Rona let herself lose focus until it was just her and her thoughts.

**Author's Note:**

> This took a few months, and even longer to find a story I wanted to tell. Hopefully with this, I can get underway with writing the rest of Rona's story, and maybe intriguing others along the way.


End file.
